Rare first (German) edition of Nevile Henderson’s white papers on Nazi Germany, written just before the outbreak of the Second World War, containing important details on antisemitism and concentration camps.
 
Nevile Henderson (1882-1942) was appointed British ambassador to Berlin in 1937. He saw his mission as divinely chosen to preserve global peace, and upon returning to Europe, he read Hitler’s Mein Kampf to better understand Nazi ideology.
 
Henderson embraced a policy of appeasement, believing that by revising the harsh Treaty of Versailles in Germany’s favour, Europe could avoid another war. However, he fundamentally misunderstood Hitler’s aims, thinking that the Nazi leader could be reasoned with and that his primary goal was limited territorial expansion.
 
By 1939, after the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia, Henderson’s health deteriorated, and he was sidelined. His ambassadorship ultimately failed to prevent war, and his close ties to the Nazi leadership and unwavering support for appeasement left his diplomatic legacy tarnished.
 
The first report is an assessment of the political situation in Nazi Germany and provides a detailed account of Henderson’s desperate diplomatic efforts at appeasement.
 
The second report is the most compelling, as it includes a series of documents on concentration camps and antisemitic policies in Nazi Germany. Among other things, it contains details about Kristallnacht and the concentration camps Dachau and Buchenwald.
 
Writing from the comfortable distance of the 21st century, one would imagine that this report contains more than enough information to expect the absolute worst for the fate of the Jews, homosexuals, communists and any opponents of Nazi Germany.